Nobody has right to touch woman without her consent: Court

New Delhi: Nobody has a right to touch a woman's body without her consent, a Delhi court has observed while upholding the six-month jail term of an army hospital employee for molesting a woman medical student in his chamber.

"Nobody has a right to touch a woman's body without her consent... In the instant case, it is evident that appellant (convict) had pulled the prosecutrix towards his chamber with the intention to sexually assault her and therefore, committed offence of outraging her modesty under section 354 of IPC," Additional Sessions Judge Virender Bhatt said.

The court's observation came while dismissing the appeal of convict Ashok Kumar, who was working as a stenographer in the hospital, against a magisterial court's last month order sentencing him to jail and imposing a fine of Rs 5,000 on him.

While relying on testimony of the victim, a second year student of Department of Nuclear Medicine, the judge said, "I find that the testimony of the prosecutrix is consistent with her written complaint submitted in the police station and the statements recorded during the course of investigation."

According to the prosecution, on February 2, 2011 an FIR was lodged at Dhaula Kuan Police Station on the complaint of the medical student that Kumar molested her when she was working in CT centre at the hospital around 1 PM.

It was alleged that she had gone to Kumar's chamber to check leave register when he suddenly pulled her and tried to sexually assault her, after which she stormed out of the room and telephoned her husband, who is also a doctor.

The court, while upholding the sentence, accepted the contention of the victim's husband who said that the FIR was lodged a day after the incident as the army rules require that the complaint first be made to the Commandant.

Kumar, in his appeal, had contended that trial court had erred in convicting and sentencing him and that he was falsely implicated by the woman and her husband.

The court, however, dismissed his plea saying he has no defence to accusations levelled against him and he was "trying to create one.